


Red Right Hand

by specialdestiny



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, One-Shot Collection, POV on major events
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-19
Updated: 2019-07-22
Packaged: 2020-07-08 11:54:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19869232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/specialdestiny/pseuds/specialdestiny
Summary: A small collection of short one-shots following Tommy through a few key moments in his life and career. Will try to update regularly. Not necessarily in chronological order (even though the first one is based on the pilot)





	1. First Blood

**Author's Note:**

> This was written some time ago, just as a drabble to get in a Tommy headspace. Future entries will be much better.

It had to be done. He knew it was true, but funny how trying to convince himself wasn't nearly as easy as he hoped. Wiping away the sheep's blood from his face with an embroidered handkerchief, he leaned his back against one of the filthy stacks near the port. Danny would've gotten himself killed sooner rather than later if he hadn't sent him on; as it were the Italians were sated and now he had an ghost in the beating heart of London to feed him back intel. The reasoning was solid, but here he stood, hand shaking, and pulse racing.

 **"FUCK,"** he murmured to himself as he clenched his right hand into a fist, using his left to bring a cigarette to his lips. He needed to calm his nerves before going back. Maybe Arthur and John wouldn't notice, but Pol would. Nothing got by her. The last thing he needed was her getting more suspicious than she already was ---

Furrowing his brow into the murky smoke-stained sunlight, he tried to run through the plan again -- working every detail over in his mind. He was sure he'd thought of every possible outcome -- accounted for every possible variable and stumbling stone; but somehow he couldn't help but worry there would be something coming he wasn't expecting. One final _fuck you_ from the powers that be.

Drawing in a deep and ragged breath, he let it out in an audible and exhausted sigh. Milking out the last few precious drags of his cigarette, he flicked it away to smolder in the damp muck underfoot and straightened his posture -- shoulders squaring within his long, threadbare coat. He looked every bit the lowbrow bookmaker he was at a glance, but there was something more beneath the surface. In the way he walked like a man worth something. In the way those around him turned their gazes away as he went on by. In the respect he commanded. Deep within his crystalline blue eyes there was a simmering turbulent hunger. It was ravenous, and insatiable. A confidence unbefitting a man of his station.

He passed the stacks, the thick cloying smog of coal fire hardly fazing him at all. His well worn shoes splashed into puddles of muck that were more shit than dirt, but he carried on. Murmurs broke out and he ignored them, eyes straight ahead -- focused ever onward towards his goals. He side stepped a pair of steel workers balancing a beam down the streets, and raised an arm as a group of soot and mud covered children breezed past him, laughing and hooting, entirely oblivious to what hell they lived in. Just the same as he ignored the sheer magnitude of what he hoped to achieve -- the absolute futility of his quest -- he banished any further foul voice of dissenting concern from his thoughts, even as the Garrison came into sight.

It'd be alright.

Yeah.

Everything was going to work out fine.

And if it didn't, if something came and stood in his way -- then he'd fucking find a way to dig his way out _just like before._ The time of him letting things be as they were was done. A gift had been given to him -- a ticket out of the squalor his family had long since known. A ticket out from under the thumb of those with all the power.

Power was taken, not given. _It was time to take._


	2. Graceless Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy pens a letter to Grace, and contemplates letting a coin decide his fate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's contents was voted on by my twitter followers, and written in 10 minutes! It was an exercise in speed writing. Let me know if it feels too jilting!

Tommy Shelby was not a man who ever doubted what he wanted. He was a man who knew himself. Who knew the cost of his desires, and he knew it well. When he was a younger man, foolish and unsullied by the horrors of war, he’d been less sure of himself. He’d left room for doubt to creep at the edges of his mind. He'd agonize over choices until he was given the concept of the coin flip. He could still see his father's face as he handed his boy the mottled quid, explaining the concept to him. 

_It’s cause you’re too clever,_ his mother would have said, looking at her son with an amused sort of pity -- _you think too much, Thomas._ His mother had been much freer, and followed the whims of her heart. Not one to understand the tribulations of insight that befell her second son.

But he knew that no man could ever think too much. Thinking kept you alive. Thinking got you places. It’s why the enterprise never went anywhere under Arthur’s leadership. His brother was a man of action -- but short on contemplation.

Never had Tommy hesitated to do what he knew to be right.

Never until now.

The typewriter’s ink was still drying as he ran his thumb across the scarred face of the coin. He almost hesitated to flip it. He was certain of the correct choice. Certain of what he wanted -- only, he wasn’t. For the first time in his adult life, he had the faintest of doubts, and it _fucking terrified him_.

Grace’d done a real number on him, he'd give her that. She'd done what no other person had ever managed. She bested Tommy Shelby at his own game. Moreover, she’d made him love her. He wished he could curse her for it, wished even more he could hate her for it -- but he didn’t. How could he admonish her for doing the same as him? Doing what she had to so that she could reach her goals? 

Neither of them could have foreseen falling in love. He would not blame her for it, either.

Now he stood at a crossroads, knowing there was only one right choice. Knowing that to abandon all he’d fought for now would be foolishness. Knowing that no matter what the coin landed on, he’d make the sensible decision. He’d stay. _Of course he would_. 

So why then was he scared to give fate the chance to mock him?

It was a child’s device, anyhow; letting chance dictate his actions. It was foolhardy. 

He closed his eyes and a vision of Grace flooded his mind’s eye. If he focused, he could even smell the sweet tinge of her perfume. Exhaling a thick cloud of nicotine, he stared once more at the coin. It was little more than ceremony at this point. Tossing it just to say he did. 

_Why the fuck not?_

The coin soared through the air, its outcome meaningless. He would not be going to New York. He would not be seeing Grace again. He would live on without her, and she’d live a happier life for not having him in it. 

_Heads I go, tails I stay._

He couldn’t help the bated breath he held captive behind his teeth, watching as it tumbled down, end over end, catching the dull light as it went. Whatever the outcome, it would be for him alone to know. 

The coin clattered to the desk, and he clapped his hand over it before his eyes could focus. Behind the bony cage of his ribs, his heart’s beating picked up -- ever so slightly. Maybe it was better he not look. It didn’t matter anyway. What the fuck difference would it be if he saw the outcome?

Scraping the coin off the table and into his palm without a glance, he snuffed out his dying cigarette. 

It didn’t matter.

It never _had_ mattered.

Tommy Shelby was not a man to be loved. Tommy Shelby was a man with ambitions. 

The pain left aching where recently he had known happiness would dull in time. 

Or so he hoped.


	3. Sweet Mud

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy really hates the mud under Flanders' field.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk what this is, kids. idk.

Gone. All gone. All of em. All but him and the two ghosts of men who he knew had helped pull him out. How long had it been? Hours? Minutes? Days? 

He could still taste the mud, that damned sweet mud. No mud tasted quite like Flanders’ mud, he’d decided long ago. And oh how he tasted it… He forgot what water used to feel like going down his throat. What food tasted like without the grit of the mud tainting it. Forgotten the sun too, for a time. There’d been only digging. Because he was small, they’d said. Lithe. Agile. Perfect for the tunnels, they’d declared, stamping his papers and shoving him off. The tunnels… those bloody, bloody tunnels. He taste the mud, he thought, but he wasn’t in the tunnels. He wasn’t drowning in muck and soil anymore. He was safe. He was -- 

\-- holding his breath, terrified blue eyes watching the furthest wall of the tunnel, certain death was clawing its way through that thick, sweet clay, thirsty for his blood alone. Faintly he could hear shouts behind him, felt hands grabbing at him, pulling him back, but he stayed put. He stayed watching. 

There’d been an explosion a few moments ago, not in their tunnel but one nearby. Gas -- they all had agreed. Too loud for a mine. French? German? Who bloody knew. It wasn’t his war, but here he was. Thing about the gas attacks was they were chain reactions. One blew, caught another pocket, blew that one. And if it wasn’t more gas it was blowing, it was a fucking mine. They were as good as dead down here, he knew, even as he felt another concussive blast through the earth to his left, raining down mud and dirt on him, putting out the light of his oil lantern -- breaking it too. 

The whole tunnel was caving in. They were all going to die. They were all going to be buried in their own graves. And who would miss him really? It’d be just his luck that Arthur was already dead out there. His body seemed to react on its own, clawing at the mud as he hurried backwards in a crawl, shouting something he didn’t even think about to his companions. What had he said? There’d been a crack in his voice. 

They had to dig the mines out from under the troops above him. If they did it now, it'd collapse with the tunnel and never hurt a soul. He kept shouting to dig, kept demanding they not retreat. They had to dig. His hands found a pick, and he began madly hacking at the earth above his head. His heart pounded so loudly that all other sound drowned out. They had to dig. Had to stop the next explosion. Had to foil it. Mud rained down on him, filling his mouth and his nostrils. He spat it out, and kept going. He was -- -- 

\-- blinking into a harsh light, eyes wincing away from it as a hand rose to shield it from view. An unfamiliar set of gloved hands rose to push his hand down out of the way. He was cold, he realized, and what he thought was a wall was actually the ceiling of a tent. Turning his head he saw a bloody figure that might have been Freddie Thorne once upon a time, but before he could open his mouth to speak, the same hands were grabbing his jaw and turning his face forward. The light was back and he hissed, recoiling from the touches. 

“He’s concussed. Possible internal bleeding,” he heard a voice say, realizing after the fact that it’d been a French voice. Did he speak French? He wondered to himself, bewildered. Another set of hands joined the first, but all Tommy saw was the blinding light. This new set of hands had an English voice. “Get him in the truck with the others. These men are heroes -- we’re going to make sure they live to be thanked for it.”

Hero?

Tommy laughed audibly, his smile splitting his cracked and bloody lips in a terrible way. The grin looked out of place on him, almost haunting to anyone who happened to see it. 

Hero! He repeated the word in his mind. Imagine it, Tommy Shelby: war hero. He laughed again, a pressing thought at the back of his mind insisting that it was cold. Very very cold. His eyelids felt heavy, and he let them close for a moment. A touch immediately found him, shaking him, urging him awake, but he was already gone -- not back in the tunnels, but back home.

Near the stacks, he knew by the smell, a girl stood not too far off. Dark hair, pale skin. She was beautiful. He reached out for her, but she slowly began to retreat from him. His heart felt an odd sort of guilt mingled with longing as his feet set off, chasing after her. She took him around corners, and off into the fathomless distance, all the while her visage growing more and more faint. He stumbled after her, oblivious to the terrain around him seemingly evaporating into mist as he passed what ought to have been solid objects. Until at last she too vanished.

Greta, he thought, finding himself distraught by her absence. Greta was ill, he thought -- yes that was right. She’s in bed, I ought to bring her something to eat, ought to -- 

The light was back, and this time he felt the turn of wheels beneath him. His body bounced in a painfully jarring rhythm, and the sound of an engine rattled roughly at the fringes of his awareness.

“Oi!! Oi, he’s awake!” he heard the familiar voice of Danny Whizbang cry out, and then there was a hand under his head. “Just you ‘old on Tommy, they’re gonna fix you right up.” 

The light was harsh, but he could make out the face. Danny. Danny and Freddie. Yeah, that’s right. They were alive. He remembered now. As if to remind him, he heard Freddie’s voice too, giving a warm welcome to him from across the jilting truck bed they shared. 

Drawing in a breath, Tommy focused everything on his surroundings. He tested his strength by lifting his head, and then by slowly trying to sit up. He wasn’t cold anymore, and he could feel bandages wrapped around his head, and another across his chest. 

He was out. They were out. But they were only three of so many more. He didn’t need to ask how it had all ended. He could read it on both their faces. He could remember, he thought, if he really wanted to -- but some things were best left buried in the sweet fucking mud.

“Either of you shitheads have a smoke?” he asked in a hoarse voice, wincing at the pain in his head. Danny seemed to laugh, a sound that bordered on hysterics, and he could tell it soon turned to quiet tears, but it was Freddie who impressed him. He was beat up, probably looked worse than Tommy did, though he had no way to prove it -- but you wouldn’t know it. 

Freddie sat up right, eyes clear and sharp as a hawk, watching Tommy with a scrutiny he didn’t much like. Scowling at his friend, he pulled the blanket draped over himself up to his chin. He wanted to demand to know what the man was staring at, but the idea of it sounded exhausting. So he settled for a sullen glare, and silence until Freddie found it agreeable to speak up.

It was three agonizing hours later when they finally came to a stop, his back and ass more bruised from the truck ride than the tunneling, and Tommy realized he could still taste the fucking mud. He wondered if he’d ever get the taste out. 

Probably not.

A small team of English nurses and soldiers helped Danny out of the truck first, each one frantically making notes and marks on papers and files, and it seemed they’d driven out of a war zone and right into the heart of a business operation. 

Left alone with Freddie, he glanced again to find the man still staring at him. It was unnerving now, and he glowered. “What -- “ he’d begun to say but Freddie interrupted him.

“You could’ve died.” 

Well that was fucking over simplified, wasn’t it? Tommy thought, sighing. “We all could’ve died, Fredd -- “ 

“You could have died, Tommy. You. Because you were being foolish.” 

“Yeah? Well, maybe I wanted t’die. You ever consider that, Freddie?” Tommy was tired now, eyes desperate to shut once more now that there was no more knocking and bouncing. His voice was gritty as the sand they’d been living in for weeks. 

“Tommy -- “

He heard the urgency, felt the shift in the truck’s weight and focused his eyes sharply as Freddie moved to be right in front of him. Something was truly weighing on the man, he realized. His brow furrowed as he tried to understand. 

“ -- Tommy you saved them. Me and Danny and the soldiers above. You should be dead, Tommy. “ 

Blinking a few times, he struggled to recall, but the pain in his head was so throbbing. He remembered bits. Fragments. Pieces. He remembered mud. 

“Guess I’ll just have to die later then, eh?” he asked wryly, desperate to just smoke. Just one cigarette. Maybe that’d get the taste out, he reasoned. Freddie seemed frustrated with him, but before more could be said the nurses who’d taken Danny out were back and hauling Tommy out on the stretcher made of thin, uncushioned wood he’d been on since they put him on the truck.

Slowly the image of Freddie Thorne in the back of the truck, watching him go grew further and more distant. As the image grew unfocused and his heavy eyelids began to win the war for his consciousness, Tommy Shelby couldn’t help but wonder if Freddie really thought he’d ever let him die…

That wasn’t what friends did, he told himself. And Freddie wasn’t just his friend. Freddie was his brother. 

Closer than a brother.

Nothing would ever come between them.

Darkness and sweet serenity befell him then; soon he’d awake to a brave new world and a future as bright as the murky skies of Birmingham itself.

And Freddie Thorne would do the same.


End file.
